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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 12 Hansard (11 November) . . Page.. 3963 ..

MS McRAE (continuing):

that such people can be invited from time to time to address the board, can be invited to react to board decisions and to offer new initiatives. These people could be picked from around Australia when new and interesting things are happening in terms of vocational education in Year 12.

I will come back to my substantive point of difference. What I found when I was thinking about it is that the level of thinking about the board had been in terms of the balance between government and non-government interests, forgetting that the shift has gone to the greater inclusion of parents, meaning, of course, a greater level of community input, and the inclusion of employers. It has moved away from an entirely government and non-government educational institution board to a much broader-based board than it was before. So, when you start to think about that, the logic then comes. I am afraid that, on every other board that I am aware of, where the Chamber of Commerce is represented, so is the TLC. I do not accept the argument, which is put by some, that the AEU represents the TLC. They do not. They are there to represent the Australian Education Union and its members.

If we look at the composition of the board as it is currently proposed, there is a lovely set of matching pairs. We have the VETA - the Vocational Education and Training Authority - along with the Canberra Institute of Technology - the CIT. We have the Australian National University and we have the University of Canberra. We have the Association of Independent Schools and we have the Australian Education Union. We have the chief education officer from the Catholic Education Commission and we have someone from the Secondary Principals Association from the government side. We have the ACT P and C for the government schools and we have the Association of Parents and Friends from the non-government schools. We have the chief executive from the Department of Education and we have the executive officer of the board itself. As well, we have the ACT Chamber of Commerce.

It seems to me that once you start to pair them off the Chamber of Commerce looks a little lonely. It is missing its partner; it is missing the TLC. I think it is very important to remember that, particularly in the light of the push to include vocational education and training, to include the CIT; to look at the broader base of what all this education is for; to move away from just an academic role and to have a really good look at accredited vocational education authorities; to look at accrediting other educational outlets, and to look at the role of assessment in a broader context. It seems to me that, once you have the employer in, you have to put in the TLC. That broad range of interests that the employer represents, I think, has to be matched by the broad range of interests that the TLC, the Trades and Labour Council, represents. I think there is therefore a gap. If you start rethinking this board, not in terms of the government and non-government sectors but looking at the broader role that this very important board plays, I think that inclusion is a necessity. To follow up on that, later I will be moving an amendment which people can debate on its merits.

I want to reiterate that I am very pleased that we are moving to this. It is very important, as we have seen in the past, that we remove all capacities for Ministers or a government to involve themselves in any way in this, so that there is absolutely no expectation that any government, opposition, legislative assembly or anybody else can interfere in the registration of courses, in the assessment of students, or in the credibility and quality of

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